"To play a wrong note is insignificant; to play without passion is inexcusable."​-Ludwig van Beethoven

Beethoven, a teacher himself, is said to have given his student this sage advice. Isn't this what we strive to do as musicians: to play with passion, and truly "feel" the music?

Unfortunately, I have found that most of my students don't instinctively play "with feeling." How can we help our students to learn this skill? I think the first step is to help students understand exactly what their music is saying, so they can communicate these ideas to the listener. I like to tell my students that playing a piece of music is like telling a story without using any words. Once students understand how to communicate the thoughts and feelings behind their music, they can eventually begin to connect these ideas to their own personal experiences and emotions and start to feel the music as they play.

Here are a few ideas I use to help my students begin to communicate the ideas behind their music. It isn't always easy, but through a combination of visual imagery, descriptive adjectives, technical movements, and practice, I find that my students have fun exploring the thoughts behind their music and finding an emotional connection to their pieces.

Let the title be your guide!Many pedagogical pieces have descriptive titles to make it easy for students to understand the thoughts behind the music. Ask your students: what images does this title bring to mind? Is this piece inspired by a place, or a particular mood? What adjectives might you use to describe the music? I sometimes help students do an online image search to find a picture that fits the music and offers visual inspiration. If a student is playing a classical piece without a descriptive title, such as a minuet, it can be helpful to look at pictures of classical era art, architecture, or fashion to give students a historical framework for playing the piece expressively. For example, you might imagine someone dancing a minuet in a fancy gown. Create your own descriptive title to fit the music if you like!

Choose the technique you need to create the sound you want. Once students have described the type of sound they want based on the title, discuss what technique you would need to create that sound. Do we need a sneaky sound, as if we are tiptoeing across the keys? Do we need a smooth elegant sound, as if we are gliding across the dance floor? Do we need a bold sound, requiring the use of arm weight? Maybe we need all of these sounds at different points in the piece! Help students to decide which technique is most appropriate at different points in the music.

Mark the music! Now it is time to match our ideas to the music. Mark the score with descriptive adjectives or sentences that describe the story we are telling as we play. Use stickers or different colors to help students visualize the sound they would like to create at different points in the piece. Write in the technical movements students will need to practice to create the sounds they want.

Get into character. The final step in communicating our piece effectively is to remember to get into character and practice truly performing a piece. Take a moment to visualize the story and, like an actor or actress, get into character and communicate this story to the audience. From the first note to the very last note, we want our audience to be able to understand exactly what we are trying to say without words. To paraphrase Beethoven, don't worry about the wrong notes--just play with feeling!

What do you think? Do you have any tips to help students "feel the music"? Please leave a comment below!

I love working on improvisation with my students! I think it is important for students to experience the joy of creating music away from the written page. Improvisation also helps students to put into practice the music theory concepts they are learning in their lessons: playing chords, keeping a steady beat, organizing their ideas into measures and phrases…and the list goes on!

Today I would like to share a basic improv activity that you can customize for your students. Before my students tackle this activity, they have already done a couple of partner improv activities, such as my story-based improv activity (found here) or improvising a melody on the black keys as I play a duet.

This improv activity will help students learn three important skills:

1) How to improvise with a steady beat, using 4 beats per measure.2) How to create a melody that matches a given chord progression.3) How to use a simple form to organize their ideas.

Are you ready to improvise? Let’s go!

Step 1: Choose the rhythm for your melody.While some students can naturally improvise with a steady beat, for others this can be a struggle. Set students up for success by giving them a rhythmic template to guide their improvisation.

The best way I have found to do this is by using silly rhythm words. Together, we create two short sentences, each containing four beats, which students can alternate throughout their improv. For inspiration, you might use a student’s favorite food, their name and the name of a friend or a pet, a favorite movie, a favorite sport or activity—anything goes! An example from a recent improv with one of my students: “I like pizza. Yum, yum, yum!”

Step 2: Choose your chords.For a student’s first improv, I suggest using the chords A minor, G major, and F major to create a four bar progression that can be repeated (Am-G-F-G). These chords are close together on the piano, so they are easy to maneuver for even young students. Students also enjoy the minor, slightly Spanish sound of this chord progression. Once students get the hang of improvising, any four bar chord progression will work!

Step 3: Choose your melody.Now we will create a melody to fit to the rhythm words we chose. For a first improv with the chords above, I suggest students use the first five notes of the A minor scale: A, B, C, D, E. I give students two rules for creating their melody: 1) Start each measure with a note that is in your chord, and 2) Use mostly steps. Of course, we know that composers break these rules all the time, but these two principles will help students create tuneful, consonant melodies on their first try—building a sense of confidence.

Step 4: Organize your ideas with a simple form.I tell students that just like a story, their improv should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. This is an easy way to get students used to grouping their ideas into sections and using contrast to delineate the sections of their improv.

Beginning: encourage students to create a 4 measure introduction using the four chords from their progression. Broken chords work especially well for this purpose. Students can use one of their rhythm sentences to structure the beginning of their piece if they like.

Middle: the middle of our improv will be formed by the 4 bar chord progression, repeated to form an 8 bar phrase, along with a right hand melody using the rules above.

End: encourage students to create an ending using the tonic chord of their chord progression; in this first example this would be an A minor chord. This ending can be as fancy as broken chords played hand over hand up or down the piano, or as simple as a single low note.

By following these four steps, students can create a short piece that makes sense melodically, harmonically, and rhythmically—a great first step for more complicated improvisation experiences! The great thing about this activity is that it can be repeated and customized—experiment with using different chord progressions, adding more rhythmic patterns, alternating blocked and broken chords in the left hand, lengthening the number of measures in each section…the possibilities are endless!

What do you think? Do you encourage your students to improvise? Please share your experiences in the comments!

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